


We'll always have Paris

by Adara_Rose



Series: The Great Plot Bunny Extermination of 2018 [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst and Romance, Death in Childbirth, Infidelity, M/M, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-20
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-29 23:23:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15739416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adara_Rose/pseuds/Adara_Rose
Summary: They always knew that they wouldn’t get to keep each other.That their time was finite. But love doesn’t care.And no matter what happened, they’d always have Paris.





	We'll always have Paris

_ But underneath we had a fear of flying _

_ of getting old, a fear of slowly dying _

 

Love is beautiful. No matter its ways, its place, its time, or its consequences. Harry had always believed that with all his heart, and so when the opportunity came to love a very special man he took it with every fibre of his being. He drank in dark eyes, devoured the smile that set him aflame, covered every inch of dark skin he could reach with burning kisses. Outside the window, the Parisian summer throbbed with promises, most of them unspoken. But in that little room in the little house near the Seine, every promise was whispered as bodies came together, over and over and over again, making love late into the night and again in the morning. 

 

But they didn’t just make love. They wandered through the city for hours, having too many drinks and too many pastries, buying gaudy souvenirs and admiring the scenery. They kissed on the riverbank, danced in the rain by the Eiffel Tower, spent hours and hours in the Louvre (but never bothered to see the Mona Lisa). 

 

It was so easy to love him, Harry thought. As if their pasts were irrelevant. As if everything that had happened was just water under the bridge, did not matter anymore. Blaise worshipped him, every scar, ever wound, every dark memory - he loved them all, kissed them away when the nightmares took over, when the darkness closed in. Brought morning croissants when Harry was unable to get out of bed. Kissed his bare skin until it ached when he couldn’t speak. And he loved him for that. 

 

But the best days were probably those in the car. A red sports car, for how could it be anything else? How could a man such as the one who kissed him like he was precious drive anything else? They’d drive around aimlessly, both in and outside of the city, their hands clasped together as they enjoyed the peace of being together, their own little world where anything that happened was theirs and precious.

 

Harry believed with all his heart that love is a beautiful thing. But he also knew that eventually, that which is beautiful must end. And it did, on the first day of autumn. When they had to return to the real world, with its obligations and expectations and duties. 

 

When they had to say goodbye.

 

\---

 

_ It seems no one can help me now _

_ this time I have really led myself astray _

 

The book flew across the room and collided with the wall mere inches from Harry’s face. He didn’t so much as blink as he stared at the hysterical woman who had thrown it.

“I can’t believe you’re choosing another man over our family!” Ginny screeched. 

“What family?” Harry spat, unable to contain his anger and pain any longer.

“Merlin, how can you say that? We have children!” Ginny’s beautiful face contorted.

“Don’t you think I know that!” Harry hissed, hands gesticulating in a way that could mean anything.

“And you still fucked him!”

“The hell I did!” His eyes flashed green fire, “I made-”

“Don’t you dare say that you made love to him!”

“What, can’t handle the truth?” He sneered at her, hating how pain made him cruel. She didn’t deserve this.

“I am your wife!” Ginny screamed, tears streaming down her pale cheeks. He knew he was hurting her, but something inside made him unable to stop.

“Do you want to be?” He asked instead, trying to control the damage he was doing.

“What sort of question is that?” The look she gave him was pitiful, but where it would normally want him to take her into his arms and soothe away the pain it now made him angry. Both at himself, and at her.

“An honest one! You know what honesty is, don’t you?” The rage came out in every word. But it wasn’t her he was angry with.

“What is that supposed to mean?” Ginny stared at him in something that was a mix of bewilderment and fear.

“Do you honestly think I don’t know about your precious keeper?” Ginny paled, her eyes widening. Then they narrowed again, her own rage shining through.

 

“That was once!” she hissed, “And I sure as hell didn’t fall in love with him!” 

Harryäs gaze was incredulous. What he had done was somehow worse? 

He didn't realize he had said it aloud until Ginny shrieked at him again.

“You know it was! Three months, Harry!”

Well, that wasn’t fair. She was the one who had told him to go, that they needed a break, to not come back until she called him. Three months. Three months in the cold.

He opened his mouth to say so, but Ginny wasn’t having it.

“And you went and shagged another man the first chance you got!”

“That’s the problem, isn’t it? That I had the balls to love someone who wasn’t you.”

 

Ginny fell silent, looking at him like she’d never seen him before. Harry eventually found himself unable to meet her gaze, staring down at his feet like a naughty school boy.

“You loved him?” she finally asked, her voice soft and sad.

“With all my heart” Harry replied in the same tone.

The silence spread again, full of so much neither of them knew how to say.

“So where does that leave us” Ginny finally asked, sounding resigned. It hurt to hear it.

‘“I don’t know, Gin” Harry replied, leaning heavily against the wall. “I don’t know anymore.”

“Do you still love him?” Her voice said she didn’t want to know, but he answered anyway. 

“Yes. I do. So much.”

Ginny walked over slowly, bending down to pick up the book she’d thrown. She stroked the cover.

“We’re over, aren’t we.” she finally said, as she turned back and put the book down on the table where it had lain before she threw it.

Harry said nothing. It hadn’t been a question.

 

“How long have you loved him?” she said eventually. This time it was a question.

“I don’t know.” Harry gave a short, hysterical bark of laughter. “How long has the sun been shining?”

“Oh. I understand.” Ginny still didn’t look at him.

“Do you? Really?”   
“No.” she whispered.

“I’m sorry.” Harry said, feeling helpless.

“I know.”

\---

 

_ You say you miss me sometimes  _

_ when you're alone in your room _

 

It was a small café, and though it claimed to be French it was nothing like the real thing. But then, that’s usually the case. If you’ve experienced the real thing, no facsimile would ever be enough.

Still, there was coffee and croissants and cigarettes and a whole world of words that weren’t said.

“I’m not surprised” Blaise said eventually, when only the crumbs remained and the silence had become crushing.

“I’m sorry” Harry begged, but was only met with a patient smile.

“You have children” Blaise said as if it explained everything, and perhaps it did. But still, Harry begged.

“Blaise-” but he was cut off by that same, kind, patient smile that he had fallen in love with and now made his heart break.

“It’s alright, Harry.” he lit another cigarette, unendingly patient and waiting like the Eiffel Tower in the rain.

He stood up slowly, as if he didn’t know he was taking Harry’s heart with him as he left. He leaned down, pressing a sweet kiss to his temple. 

“I always knew I wouldn’t get to keep you.”

 

\---

 

_ Then I kissed him goodbye, _

_ said all beauty must die _

 

Draco didn't know how many hours he had sat in the uncomfortable chair in St Mungos maternal ward, but for at least the last one his wife had been sitting next to him, holding his hand, as they waited for news.

He was immensely grateful that Luna hadn’t offered him a single platitude along the lines of “it’s going to be all right” or “don’t worry”, just sat still and calm and held his hand in his, as patient as a river.

The screams from the birthing chamber had stopped, but there was no cries from an infant to fill the silence. There was nothing at all, just a stillness that took the whole world and ripped it to shreds. 

Time passed slowly, there was no clock in the corridor, and neither Draco nor Luna moved for long enough to find one. They simply sat, side by side and hand in hand, waiting.

 

Eventually the door opened, and a solemn looking mediwitch stepped out. Draco took one look at her face and knew what wasn’t said. Distantly, he felt Luna squeeze his hand comfortingly as she stood up.

“I better go write to Harry” she murmured. 

 

\---

 

_ And all that we held sacred _

_ falls down and does not mend _

 

It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true. It  _ mustn’t _ be true. 

Harry shook his head numbly, staring with empty eyes at the letter he clutched in his hands. Somewhere amongst  _ very sorry _ and  _ funeral  _ and  _ both died _ was the truth that he couldn’t face, couldn’t bear. But there it was, in the neat loops and curves he recognized from school, handwriting that showed up at his door regularly even though he had never once written back. 

 

Ginny hadn’t approved of Luna’s marriage, and the friendship had been strained almost to non-existence after the wedding. But Luna, brilliant Luna, hadn’t cared; she’d kept writing, even if she never got a reply. And now here was a letter from Luna, with words he didn’t want to read, a message that he couldn’t bear.

But there it was. In between the  _ very sorry’s  _ and  _ will you be attending?.  _

 

Harry staggered to his feet, almost feeling as if he had no body at all the way it betrayed him, the ways his limbs grew heavy and numb as his heart forgot how to beat, his lungs forgot to breathe.  _ Blaise _ something inside him cried.  _ Blaise, Blaise, Blaise, Blaise. _

 

Somewhere a voice screamed the name, but he didn’t realize it was his. His lungs were constricting, the world swimming, everything spinning and stopping and crashing and it was impossible to take it in, make any sense of it. His fingers clutched the letter until his knuckles turned white, but the words in it made no sense.  _ I’m sorry, they both died,  _ Luna had written. But that was impossible - both meant that it was not just Blaise. That there had been… there had been… there had been… his mind shied away from it. Couldn't accept what Luna had implied as if she thought he already knew.

 

But he hadn’t known. Had never suspected. Had never spoken to him again after that time in the café. Had never laid eyes on his beautiful face again and now he never would.

 

Harry opened the window as if in a stupor, struggling to climb as one hand was still used to hold the letter that had ruined everything. There was a roaring in his ears like blood gushing from an open wound  _ (...took the child with him…) _

 

_ Blaise _ that same voice from earlier wailed. The world was crumbling around him, every breath he couldn’t take one step closer to annihilation. _ (...we’ll always have Paris...)  _ He stumbled, lurching forward with unseeing eyes, feet moving on their own accord. His feet slipped, but he didn’t notice. 

 

Then he was standing on the edge, the wind whipping through his hair like it had under the Eiffel Tower except it was sunny and not like then when they had kissed in the rain and thought it’d last forever and now everything was gone.

 

He turned his face up to the sky, warm as dark hands stroking his skin. Heard a baby giggling somewhere, safely cradled in strong arms.

 

He stretched out his arms, heard the voice from earlier (his voice) scream  _ Blaise!. _

  
He took a single step forward.

 

_ And he rode along through Paris,  _

_ with the warm wind in his hair _


End file.
